Reality. Check.
A week ago I boarded a nine hour, two-stop bus ride leaving Tamarindo and heading to my next destination. I was greasy from only taking cold showers, hungry from only eating granola bars, and tired from being up all night swatting away mosquitoes and bugs. My volunteer work was over and the only conclusion about life I had come to was that I was going to move to California. I was terrified to return to New York.
And then the most miraculous thing happened… I walked into air conditioning. I took a hot shower. I ate a handful of almonds and some fresh mango. I sipped a glass of red wine. REAL red wine. (I shudder at the thought of the sour pink wine I was served at our local bar in San Ramon). After I was pampered for a bit, I sat down and took in some tough love.
I was asked questions that I didn’t have an answer to. I was made to feel like an intelligent, successful “grown up.” I was treated as an intellectual equal by two brilliant, warm and wise adults, while being guided in the same gentle manner as a doe-eyed teenager. I felt like my own parents had somehow channeled themselves through these non-biased and compassionate mentors. I listened. And I learned.
I return home in a less than a week, and I finally feel like I’m ready to go back. I have direction and I have a purpose.
Most importantly, I’ve found balance between my harshly realistic outlook on my career and my overly idealistic views on love. I know my worth.
As you all read this I’ll be sitting on a speed boat to Mal Pais to conclude my trip. It will be my last few days to “vacation”- to unwind, take in the scenery, explore the culture, read those books I’ve been saving, meet more people, and get owned by a few more waves. I have a seriously intense road ahead of me and I plan to savor every moment of the serenity, here and now.
But have no fear New York… I’m coming home. Hold on to a few of those majestic fall colors until I return.
Who Are You?
Life has a funny way of turning you into someone you never thought you would be. From a very young age we are taught to put a label on ourselves, forcing us to grow up feeling compelled to follow the “dream” of our choice for the rest of our lives, for the consequence of NOT following that dream results in failure. In our first year of school, when the teacher asks “What do you want to be when you grow up?” we are immediately pressured to start thinking about our future, when all we want to do is play with toys, color, and hang out with our friends at recess. Do you know what I wanted to be when I was that age? A cashier. Because I thought I would get to keep all that money. It’s shocking my parents didn’t gear me up for a lifetime membership with MENSA. My brother, who is now entering his fourth year of med school, had the outstanding ambition to become an ice cream man. I’m confident he has no regrets.
But let me step outside for a moment from thinking about how career choices define us, and look closer at how who we are as a PERSON defines us. Lately, I’ve been an angry person. We’re not talking a bad case of PMS. We’re talking a frown-line inducing, short fuse blowing, be-nice-to-me-or-I-will-punch-you-in-the-face kind of person. And sadly, that’s not who I am. Years of internal struggling with it taking so long to become who I thought I would be, coupled with some bad burns and let downs by people and careers that I believed in and gave my all too, left me slightly jaded and immensely frustrated. ”It shouldn’t be this hard,” the sad little angel on my shoulder thought recently. If you love, you should be loved in return. If you work hard, you should see the reward. “Well get with the times sister,” the nasty little devil replied on the other side. ”The only person you can count on is yourself, so just shut everyone else out.” (DISCLAIMER: I am NOT crazy, nor do I have an angel and devil sitting on my shoulder. They reside comfortably in my head. OK. Maybe I’m a little bit crazy). For awhile, the devil was in the lead. That little sucker is convincing when he wants to be. He took the words I wanted to write and stored them in a place where I couldn’t reach them. He drenched my eyes in tears and changed my fat girl laugh into a starving girl’s pout. He stole my hope. And hope is not easy to come by these days.
But he didn’t win.
Because my angel was much more clever. She didn’t come at me with force and she didn’t tell me what I had to do. Instead, she gently whispered in my ear at night while I tossed and turned. She showed up in the bright smiles and genuine laughter of my beautiful friends. She sank her arms into the warmest hugs to make them feel that much tighter. She appeared in my inbox in the form of a job proposal, in my text message in the form of dinner plans with a loving mentor, in conversations with my cousins, in my bank account as a plane ticket to visit an old friend, and in the mirror when I pushed myself harder and harder in my daily workouts, overcompensating for my emotional instability by challenging my physical strength. My angel didn’t tell me what I had to do or who I had to be, she has let me try to figure it out myself.
To be honest, I still don’t know. I battle loneliness and sadness like any other person living in New York. It’s a big city and small town all at once, and I find it hard to escape from my own head at times. I am harder on myself than anyone else could ever possibly be, and I recognize that if I don’t lighten up on ME, I will never lose that anger. So I’m trying. I’m trying to smile more at people. Even random strangers. I’m looking at the positives in shitty situations. I’m feeling immensely thankful for the relationships in my life that I can count on, and no longer hiding out of fear and shame. I have never wanted to be someone who conforms to be what someone else thinks I should be, and I never will. You should change because you want to. Not for anyone but yourself.
The journey of life is about survival. You learn who you are in the high points, but you learn even more in the lows. You accumulate bruises that fade and scars that never heal. You acquire crows feet around your eyes and call them laugh lines. You do things to keep you close to the people you’ve lost, because even if they are gone they are still a part of your soul.
I think when children are asked “What do you want to be when you grow up?” the answer should be, “I want to be me.”
1